Oklahoma Senate Pro Tem Lonnie Paxton says Senate Republicans' overarching agenda is complete.
"Everything that I think the priorities are, kind of, all have been accomplished either with the budget or in... the recent weeks," Paxton said.
Republican priorities have revolved around balancing education and health spending with an overall agency request shortfall. Paxton says bills that are still pending represent the goals of individual lawmakers and constituent requests.
"I know everybody's got some bills here and there that they're interested in," he said. "The Senate…right now, we're hearing all the House bills that have came over, and we continue to push through those."
Major initiatives included raising Oklahoma's minimum teacher salary by $2,000, increasing the cap on Parental Choice Tax Credits and expanding early literacy and math intervention programs. All those are included in the state budget, which lawmakers have already approved and Gov. Kevin Stitt has signed.
Several of the bills to hammer out the details of those changes have either been signed by Stitt, or advanced to their final floor chamber discussion and vote.
Senate Education Chair Adam Pugh, R-Edmond, ran Senate Bill 1778, which overhauls the state's Strong Readers Act to include a third grade retention rule for students who don't meet reading standards. It was ceremoniously signed by Stitt at John Rex Charter Elementary School in April.
House Bill 1087 by Rep. Dick Lowe, R-Amber, would require schools to add one instructional day for every $25 million invested to raise the minimum salary schedule. It has been sent to the governor. The bill to actually adjust the salary schedule by $2,000, SB 201 by Pugh and Rep. Chair Chad Caldwell, R-Enid, was amended in the House and is awaiting final approval in the Senate.
House Bill 4427 by House Speaker Kyle Hilbert, R-Bristow, would require adjunct teachers without a bachelor's degree to enroll in a program or show 20 years of relevant teaching experience. It still awaits final approval in the House after being passed back and forth by both chambers.
"We wrapped up our committee process last week," Hilbert said, "And so very busy hearing a lot of Senate bills that are our friends across the rotunda sent over to us, starting to make our way through a handful of House bills as well that the Senate amended."
Hilbert said during his weekly presser he's especially proud that House Bill 2288, a bill allowing retired teachers to get jobs without seeing cuts to their retirements, has been sent to Stitt.
Democrats have also advanced major initiatives to the governor, like Senate Bill 1317, by Tulsa Democrats Sen. Jo Anna Dossett and Rep. Melissa Provenzano. The measure would allow career teachers who move districts to maintain that status at their new school if approved by the board.
There are still more than 600 bills left to be considered between the House and Senate, heading into the final weeks of the legislative session, according to the legislative tracking service LegisOK. And the governor has more than 200 measures already on his desk, waiting for a signature.
Stitt will have five days to sign, veto or ignore measures, if he gets them any time before the last five days of the legislative session. Any bills sent to him then that he ignores will automatically become law.
But if lawmakers send Stitt their bills within the last five days, then Stitt gets two weeks to sign them, and if he doesn't they fail and don't become law. The move is known as a pocket veto.
Stitt vetoed 39 bills last year, setting a record for his time in office. This year he's vetoed six. And legislative leaders said they've had no discussions of overriding anything yet.
"We have not even gone down that road," Paxton said. "There really has not been a whole lot of vetoes. I know there's been a couple of them out there, but there's not — there has not been leadership discussions on that."
The legislature has until May 29, per the state constitution, to formally end the session.
